


five stages

by reddieforlove



Series: Mileven Drabbles/Oneshots [5]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Sad Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 15:37:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13216818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddieforlove/pseuds/reddieforlove
Summary: A broken promise.





	five stages

**Author's Note:**

> This was given to me as a prompt on tumblr. It is super angsty. Heed the tags.
> 
> **If you would like to send me any prompts, you can go[right here](https://reddieforlove.tumblr.com/ask). Anonymous or not, canon, au, fluff, angst, aged up, whatever you want goes with the exception of noncon/dubcon.**
> 
> .

**DENIAL**

She could have been sleeping.

That was the first thought that Mike had when he saw the chief carrying her up the steps. With her head tucked against his shoulder and her eyes closed peacefully, she could have been sleeping. But there were bloodstains on her lips and her ears. There was no flush in her cheeks. No bright eyes blinking at him as Hopper carried her right past him and into the house. No soft “Mike” falling from her too-pale lips. He didn’t understand. His mind couldn’t grasp what he was seeing. Or maybe it just wouldn’t.

She could have been sleeping.

**ANGER**

It didn’t take long for burning fury to fill his chest and a red haze to settle over his mind. All he had to see was the chief brushing a stray lock of dark hair away from her face.

“Three hundred and fifty-three,” he said quietly.

No one looked at him but Nancy, who was quietly crying in Jonathan’s arms.

“Mike-” she said, reaching out towards him with a shaking hand.

He stepped away from her, staring at Hopper.

“Three hundred and fifty-three,” Mike said louder, finally getting his attention.

The older man straightened from his crouch, looking at him with understanding.

“Kid,” he sighed, looking pained as the word slipped from his lips.

“Three hundred and fifty-three!” he shouted this time, lunging forward to shove the much larger man away from her. “I could have seen her every single day for three hundred and fifty-three days! You kept her away! You lied! You fucking lied!”

He stressed every accusation with a punch to his chest, his arms, his stomach.

“I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!”

Hopper didn’t even try to stop him this time. He didn’t say anything. It only made Mike angrier. Lucas and Dustin were the ones to pull him away and Mrs. Byers was the one to tug him into her arms, holding him close as he crumpled to the floor next to the couch where she was laying. He reached up, taking her cold hand in both of his.

**BARGAINING**

He had kicked down the blanket fort. It didn’t mean anything to him without her. Yet he still sat in the destroyed remains of it, huddled amidst the blankets with his knees pulled to his chest and his radio cradled in his hands.

“Please,” Mike whispered into it, his eyes squeezed tightly shut. “Please.”

Nothing but static answered him but he wasn’t ready to stop.

“Come back,” he pleaded, his voice thick and shaky.

“You promised.”

“Please.”

“You promised you’d come back.”

“El.”

It was the first time he’d said her name since it happened. His heart thudded painfully in his tight chest.

“Please come back.”

“Please.”

“I’ll do anything.”

Static.

**DEPRESSION**

Everything reminded him of her. His house, his school, his friends. There was nowhere he could turn that she wasn’t on his mind. Mike didn’t know how much he depended on those reminders until his mother commented over dinner one night, two years after the gate was closed, that his father might be seeking a transfer to another city. Mike lost his shit, to say the least. He never talked about her, not even then. But as he clutched at the toilet after emptying the dinner he managed to eat, he made a deal with his mother. They would stay and he would see a therapist.

PTSD.

Even though Will came back, the therapist told him that the trauma of that week had affected his mind deeply. He saw things he should have never had to see at such a young age. He didn’t talk about El. Not until a full seven months into the weekly therapy visits.

Depression.

He protected people. The therapist told him that he based a lot of his identity off of this one aspect of his personality. He blamed himself more than anyone else for what happened. In his mind, _he_ was the one who failed her. He asked questions about the diagnosis. He asked if the pain would ever go away. He asked if he would stop seeing her everywhere he looked.

The therapist didn’t know.

Mike kept going even after he graduated from high school.

**ACCEPTANCE**

They buried her near Castle Byers. It had been Will’s idea. Mike hadn’t been there since the funeral. Now he was halfway through college and visiting home. His parents thought that he was visiting them out of nowhere. They didn’t know that it was  _the_ date. Someone else was already there when he walked from the Byers house to the grave. Mike wasn’t surprised to see him, even though they hadn’t spoken since that night. He walked up and stood right next to the chief. The other man wasn’t that much taller anymore. There was grey in his hair and more lines in his face. With a sigh, Hopper reached out and touched his shoulder. Mike didn’t flinch away from him, simply staring at the headstone. Neither one of them talked for a long time, standing side-by-side on the cold, hard ground.

“Do you see her everywhere?” Mike finally asked.

Hopper sighed heavily and for a moment, Mike thought that he wasn’t going to answer.

“Yeah, kid,” he said with a nod.

Mike swallowed past the thickness in his throat as Hopper’s hand dropped from his shoulder.

“I do too,” he said, his voice quiet. “But I barely even remember what she looked like anymore.”

“That’s how it’s supposed to be,” Hopper said.

He nodded, knowing that already.

“I don’t want to forget,” he said.

“You won’t. She’ll always be there. But life goes on.”

Mike didn’t say anything else, wiping the tear that fell from his eye away with his thumb. Then he crouched in front of the stone, touching his palm to the top of it.

“Bye El,” he whispered.

He closed his eyes for just a moment, somehow remembering the exact sound of her soft voice that night in the school when she killed the demogorgon.

_Goodbye Mike._

**Author's Note:**

> I would to hear what you think! Even if you want to scream at me for the pain. I will gladly accept it.


End file.
